


The Healer and his Healer

by Lamenta



Series: Lamenta's Tumblr Scribbles [9]
Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Awkwardness, Fluff and Humor, Hawke can be a pest, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Spirit Healer!Hawke, Strangers to Friends, but a nice one, mentions of sickness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-02
Updated: 2016-04-02
Packaged: 2018-05-30 19:52:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6437998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lamenta/pseuds/Lamenta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for a prompt request by jewishzevran and posted on tumblr a while back :3<br/>Prompt:<br/>"hc - a mage hawke, esp a spirit healer, helps out anders with the clinic. eventually he trusts them enough with it to leave them to run it for a few hours, which lets him get sleep."</p><p>(AO3 won't find you when I try to put you up as the giftee :/)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Healer and his Healer

The moment the bearded man with the ridiculously broad shoulders strolled through the door of his clinic, yesterday’s memories haunted him. They took him back to a tiled floor and religious ornaments, to pools of blood and blind, uncontrollable rage; the all-consuming need for vengeance, burning hotly in his veins. To his own hand, that held the dagger ending the life of a man who had once been more important to him than the air he breathed.

 

He’d told Garrett Hawke to not come back. A deal was a deal – aiding him in his friend’s rescue in exchange for the maps to the Deep Roads, which Hawke had come to retrieve the previous night, offering condolences for his loss. Anders had barely listened to the words the man had said, however compassionate, soothing and sincere they were. He didn’t need pity from a man he didn’t know, who didn’t know _him_ and would never understand that Karl Thekla’s death wasn’t the only thing to mourn.

 

“What do you want?” Anders asked tiredly as he wiped his hands on one of the dirty cloths that lay scattered across his clinic. The smell of vomit hung thickly in the air after hours of treating people with a terrible flu that was spreading across Kirkwall like a wildfire and had bereft him of much needed sleep for three days now. “We had a deal.”

 

Garrett Hawke paused his steps. His brown eyes mustered Anders’ haggard face and the dark rings he knew had to show under his eyes by now. Anders felt his hands tremble under the intense gaze and clutched the dirty cloth tightly.

 

“I was not aware our deal included me being banned from checking on you,” Hawke replied with a small smile.

 

“Which part of ‘Don’t come back’ didn’t you get?”

 

“Oh. I did hear you say that, but I also know you were in an emotional state and –“

 

“An emotional state?” Anders cut the other man off sharply. “Very well, call it what you will. That doesn’t make my words less true.”

 

“I was worried about you,” Hawke said gently. “You lost someone important that day and it’s…never easy to be the one to deliver a friend from…what did you call it? A beheading?”

 

Anders’ jaw set. “Because that’s what it is,” he grunted out angrily and Hawke lifted his hands in what was supposed to be a soothing gesture.

  
“Don’t shoot lightning at my ass?”

 

“Wish I could, but I’m out of mana at the moment.” Anders crumpled up the cloth and carelessly threw it on his desk. Since his clinic was technically empty, save for a young Fereldan girl Lirene had asked to assist him today, he could speak openly with Hawke.

 

“I get it,” Hawke said gently.

 

“No, I don’t think you do.”

 

Hawke sighed and shrugged. “Listen…I just…I felt terrible. I know what it’s like to lose someone important and I couldn’t help but think of you being all alone with your pain. I just want to help?”

 

Anders rolled his neck and began to unclasp the buckles of his coat. It seemed like he would finally get a few hours of sleep and he wasn’t going to waste them on a nosy man. Pointedly turning his back on Hawke, he pushed a few cots back into their place and marched toward the curtain separating his narrow, private room from the rest of the place.

 

“I don’t need your help,” was the last thing Anders said before disappearing behind the curtain.

 

~*~

 

One thing Anders soon learned about Hawke was, that the man was nothing if not persistent.

 

And he did not understand the meaning of the word ‘no’ either, it seemed.

 

The next morning, Anders stepped into his clinic and Hawke was there, chatting with Lirene and charming his way into that woman’s heart. The former Grey Warden opted to ignore Hawke, in hope he’d react the same way most Templars did in the past – give up and leave.

 

He didn’t. Hawke came back almost daily and Anders wondered how that man even managed to make time for this. From what he had gathered from the conversations between Hawke and the dwarf named Varric, they were collecting money so Hawke could become a partner for an expedition to the Deep Roads, instead of just tagging along as yet another mercenary. Earning money was difficult enough in the City of Chains and Anders didn’t even want to think about what kind of jobs Hawke agreed to. The ones with the most money were the nobles and shady figures, like smugglers, the Coterie or the mercenary company. Anders wasn’t fond of either sort of people. Neither was he fond of Hawke, even though he had found a fellow apostate mage in the man.

 

Days stretched into week. Sometimes, Hawke showed up during the early morning hours and left during the afternoon, “for a job”; sometimes, he came in during the late afternoon hours, usually the busiest hours in Anders’ clinic. Whenever Hawke came in late, he looked worn out and tired, but always wore that lopsided smile that charmed especially Anders’ female patients and wordlessly began to help, ignoring Anders’ angry stares. Hawke applied bandages, rummaged through his herbs collection and potions and occasionally, he’d wordlessly hand Anders something to eat or drink.

 

Realizing that angry words and demands did not impress Hawke, and neither did they make him leave with the promise to never return, Anders settled for stoic acceptance. If Hawke’s constant presence made him feel a little better, made him wonder if maybe, they could be friends and the thought was soothing after having been alone for a long time, Anders refused to admit it, whether to Lirene or himself. He decided he could live with Hawke dressing wounds and handing out potions or herbs and offer his faithless patients encouraging words or a warm smile; he could live with Hawke bringing him food and insisting he should get some rest while he took over, just like Hawke had to live with the fact that Anders would _always_ ignore him.

 

What Anders did not ignore, however, was Hawke stepping up to a patient one day and using magic on them. He had just been treating a little boy with a terrible cough when amazed gasps and a relieved sob made Anders look up and freeze at the sight of big hands illuminated by a gentle, green glow, hovering just above a terrible leg wound of a man who was clearly suffering of gangrene, the wound having festered. Anders’ fingers twitched; part of him wanted to get angry and yell at Hawke about not needing an amateur healer in his clinic, part of him just wanted to watch.

 

It became clear that Hawke was not as adept as Anders with healing. He probably lacked exercise and Anders guessed neither did Hawke have access to the necessary literature. His hands trembled, brows furrowed in concentration and Anders knew Hawke was battling to keep control over his mind.

 

“Stop fighting it,” Anders told Hawke calmly and brown eyes glanced up, surprised that Anders _finally_ spoke to him. “If you fight it, they will not be able to enhance your healing magic enough to finish this swiftly,” Anders continued. “I know it’s scary but you _have_ to trust them.”

 

Hawke’s face broke into a huge grin and Anders felt his cheeks warm at the sight. “I’m not scared!”

 

“Right,” Anders huffed and turned his back on Hawke, focusing his attention on the sick child before him. He heard Hawke clear his throat and take a deep, calming breath. Anders smiled to himself, a small smile, and it still felt strange on his face. It had obviously been too long since he’d smiled last, he had forgotten what it felt like.

 

~*~

 

Weeks stretched into months and Anders continued to marvel how Garrett Hawke still found time to come help at his clinic and _why_ he did. Rumors had it the Deep Roads expedition was about to set out. Surely, Hawke had more important things to do than help around his clinic.

 

Practice had helped Hawke improve and Anders would forever deny that he felt proud of the younger man and his eagerness to learn what being a Spirit Healer truly meant. He reminded Anders of himself, his younger self who had felt _so_ special when it became clear his talents were rare, even among mages. He had studied with the same passion, wanting to know everything and master it. It had made living in a cage bearable for a while, because the cage offered access to the necessary literature, even if said literature consisted of forbidden books, and education.

 

He envied Hawke for the chance to learn and improve in liberty.

 

It was way past midnight when Anders locked up his clinic and Garrett Hawke was still there, completely absorbed in the book Anders had given him. An elderly man was spending the night, drugged on a potion that eased the rattling in his lungs and sleeping peacefully on one of the cots. After a particularly busy day, Anders and Hawke both had been out of mana by the time the old man’s family had brought him in.

 

“Aren’t you leaving for the Deep Roads soon?” Anders asked, suppressing a yawn.

 

“In three days,” Hawke replied absently.

 

“You should get some proper rest and pack.”

 

“Mmmhmm.”

 

Sighing inwardly, Anders thought of his own bed with longing and wondered how to get the other mage out of the clinic so he could go to sleep.

 

“Why don’t you get some rest?” Hawke suggested, not looking up from the book. “I’ll read a little more and keep an eye on our guest.” A smirk formed on his lips. “And you, of course.”

 

“I don’t need you to keep an eye on me,” Anders stated and shuffled across the clinic, grabbing a book for himself. He sat down at the desk across from Hawke, and flipped the book open with determination and a huff. This did make Hawke look up questioningly.

 

“What, you think I summon demons or raid the clinic while you sleep?” he asked, lips pursed.

 

“No.” Anders rubbed over his eyes and tried to focus on the letters on the first page. They kept blurring, no matter how much he tried to fix his gaze on them.

 

“Then why don’t you just go to bed? You look ready to fall over.”

 

“I don’t trust you.”

 

Hawke frowned. “Why?”

 

“Because.”

 

Anders knew that he would hardly get past the first page. His vision kept blurring, his eyelids growing more and more heavy with each passing moment and his mind was occupied with thoughts of Hawke leaving for the Deep Roads in three days. Maker forsaken Deep Roads – one thing Anders certainly didn’t miss and made him all the more glad he’d left the Grey Wardens. Darkspawn, disfigured creatures, Blight sickness…

 

Anders realized he should feel relieved to get Hawke out of his hair soon. If his fellow mage survived, he’d be gone for at least a couple weeks. If he _didn’t_ survive, then…

 

“Do you know enough defensive spells to protect yourself?”

 

“Wouldn’t have made it out of Lothering alive if I didn’t,” Hawke replied, amused.

 

“I hope you realize the Deep Roads can hardly be compared with the downfall of Lothering, as terrible as it was.”

 

“Is that concern?”

 

Anders scowled and stubbornly flipped through the pages, pretending to be looking up a specific chapter. He wouldn’t read, but he would at least pretend he did and hoped he’d last long enough to see Hawke out.

 

 

The next thing Anders was aware of was a warm, thick blanket being draped across his shoulders and he flinched in surprise.

  
“Easy,” Hawke murmured, one of his big hands gently caressing over his head. Any protest died on Anders’ tongue because this felt good. Very good. The hand was warm and soothing, chasing away dark thoughts and the tendrils of the impending nightmare Hawke had just saved him from.

 

“I fell asleep,” Anders muttered.

 

“How did you guess?” Hawke quipped. “And look, your clinic is still in one piece and I did not summon demons while you were sleeping.”

 

To Anders, it felt like he’d been out for maybe a few minutes, an hour at the most, but when he turned around, he found the door to the clinic wide open, the lantern was lit and in the distance, the sun was rising above the Waking Sea. Their ‘guest’, as Hawke had called the old man, was sitting on his cot, still wrapped in his blanket and nursing another potion. He looked much better than he had last night, which was a relief.

 

“Did you sleep at all?” Anders groused and Hawke chuckled, the same big hand now rubbing in comforting circles on Anders’ upper back.

 

“I told you I’ll keep an eye on you, didn’t I?” Anders glanced up just in time to catch Hawke winking at him. He felt a blush creep into his cheeks and looked away.

 

“You know what I think you need?” Hawke asked.

 

“What?”

 

“An adventure!” The big hand gave Anders’ upper back a strong slap and he yelped in surprise. “A change of scenery. You need to go out and let off some steam instead of hiding away in your clinic and mourn and seethe.”

 

Anders straightened his back and stretched his arms and legs. He had forgotten how uncomfortable sleeping in a chair was and the tension in his neck was bound to annoy him for the rest of the day. “Really,” he muttered, “and where do you suggest I go to find that kind of distraction?”

 

Hawke’s smile was wicked and Anders already knew what the answer was. His mouth opened to let out a very insistent ‘No!’, but Hawke stopped him by clasping a hand across his mouth. Anders almost went cross-eyed, glaring at the offending hand.

  
“Deep Roads! Darkspawn to kill, people to keep alive…” Hawke looked almost dreamy. “Let’s face it, our chances are better when we have a Grey Warden with us.”

 

Anders lifted his gaze to glare at the other man directly.

 

“ _Former_ Grey Warden,” Hawke corrected himself, ignoring Anders’ muffled complaints. Anders realized that his attempts to protest meant his lips kept caressing over Hawke’s palms and his face turned crimson.

 

“Hey,” Hawke addressed him gently and Anders blinked, meeting the other man’s warm, gentle gaze. “Don’t worry…I’ll keep an eye on you.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [tumblr](http://lamentaslair.tumblr.com/).


End file.
